


War Games

by zombiesbecrazy



Category: DCU (Comics), Titans (Comics)
Genre: Board Games, Fluff, Game Night, Gen, Titans are BFFs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-09
Updated: 2018-03-09
Packaged: 2019-03-29 02:29:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13917480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zombiesbecrazy/pseuds/zombiesbecrazy
Summary: Every other Tuesday night, the Titans go to war.  Against each other. Across the tabletop battlefield.





	War Games

Donna looks at the chaos going around her and for the first time in a long time she feels utterly defeated and doesn’t see a good plan of attack. She doesn’t have enough fighters gathered, she really needs to save some other options that she has up her sleeve for later and there aren’t a lot of places that she can go right now that will help. She feels trapped and it doesn’t sit well with her but she can admit that she has fought back against worst. She looks at Wally with a grim look. “How worried should we be about what Dick is doing? He’s causing problems already and I have a feeling that he’s going to destroy everything because he’s so corrupt.”

Wally shakes his head and hums in agreement. “I was just thinking the same thing. Why does he have so many rogues? That can’t be good.”

Roy is drumming his fingers restlessly, looking over the field, looking for an opening to take a shot. “And all the intrigue?”

“I think he’s plotting something,” says Garth. “Something big. From the beginning, I haven’t fully trusted him.”

Lilith had been sitting with her head in her hands for the past several minutes, clearly trying to think her way through a strategy. “I know what he’s plotting and if it works, he’s going to take us all down.”

There is silence when the team waits for Donna to make her move.  She’s trying not to focus on Dick’s evil smirk. Hears Wally tapping his foot. Garth and Roy are exchanging conspiratorial looks. Lilith has her eyes closed, focused on something only she can listen to.  

She is about to push onwards when Wally interrupts her thoughts. “Alright, this is it. Someone needs to get the first player token away from Dick. Donna, it should be you because that means he’ll go last next round. That should at least slow him down. Maybe.” Wally stands up to look at the game board from a different angle, and points at the empty space at Castle Waterdeep. Donna smiles as he does it, suddenly remembering it as something that he has always done when they have played board games together in the past. Before Wally was erased from existence. Every now and then he does something that is so very _Wally_ , she can’t believe that they had could have forgotten him in the first place. How could they have forgotten this? His over competitiveness in board games was legendary and to this day he still had the longest win streak when playing Catan.

Not long into settling into their new Titans Tower in New York, game night had become a bi-weekly event, with every other Tuesday evening consisting of take-out, games, laughter and occasionally an impromptu dance party. Lots of different new and old tabletop games had been brought out, but Lords of Waterdeep was the one that they came back to most often. Other than the usual argument between Roy and Wally at the start about whose turn it was to be red and who had to be yellow, it was clear favourite for the team; the mechanics were simple, but there was enough variation from game to game that it stayed fresh.

After eating their Thai food and settling in, they were now five rounds deep into the game and Dick was clearly winning. Again.

Giving Wally a small salute, Donna puts her player down where he had pointed. “Yes, sir!” She then grabs the castle from Dick’s pile of tiles and tokens and places it on her own board.  Dick scowls and she sticks her tongue out at him in return.

“What are you guys ganging up on me for? This isn’t a co-op game so it should be every man for himself. And Lilith, no telepathy after the Betrayal at the House on the Hill debacle.” Dick picks up his Intrigue cards, reorders two of them and Donna wonders if she’s going to get some sort of retaliation for taking the first player marker away. All of the Titans are pretty vindictive with their gameplay, so she suspects so.

“I didn’t share what you were doing and it isn’t my fault you think loud when you game.” Lilith rolls her eyes at Dick's accusations. It’s always the same squabble with them. “And my cheating didn’t work last time we played Betrayal anyway.” Being able to know the betrayer’s plan in that game didn’t work if the dice didn’t roll right, and Garth is a reliably bad roller. Donna had destroyed them that night and took over the world.

“And the rest of us have an alliance so that as long as anyone but you wins, it’s good. You’ve won this game three times in a row.  That ends tonight,” says Roy, and he and Lilith share a fist bump.

Wally leans over and his eyes widen when he looks at Dick’s quest cards. “Guys, he’s somehow close to getting not just one, but two 40 point quests. We need to do something more extreme.”

Roy puts his red meeple on Waterdeep Harbor and flicks an Intrigue card at Dick, bouncing it off his forehead. “Mandatory quest, sucker!”

Dick grabs the card and throws it down on the table beside his other quests. “Damn it, Roy! All that planning…” Dick tents his fingertips and studies the board for a few moments, looking a little bit Batman-y, thinking out some options. He waves his hand at the far side of the table. “It’s not fair that all of you are joining forces against me when Garth obviously has the card that gives him points for all the buildings under his control because he somehow owns seven already.”

Four heads turn towards the board to study it and Wally groans and slumps back into his chair. “Crap.  I didn’t even see that.”

“As we all have an accord against Dick, it shouldn’t matter what my Lord card is,” says Garth slowly, raising his eyebrows at Wally.

The room falls into a few moments of silence while everyone continues to look at the board.

There is only one viable option remaining.

Donna stands and slams her hands on the table, hard enough that things shake but not so much that any of the game pieces shift, and yells, “Banish the accord! This is war!” Dick, Wally and Roy cheer as Garth drops his head onto the table and groans.

Every. Single. Week.

 “Sorry, Garth.  I agree with Donna.” Lilith moves her remaining token to the Entry Well and lays down an Intrigue card. “That building is now my building.”

“You are all traitors, scoundrels and thieves and you will rue this day that you have double crossed me.” Garth raises his head to scowl at his opponents. “Only an Atlantean can truly rule Waterdeep!” He points to Dick’s glass of water, and a mini whirlpool appears within.  Dick just picks up the glass and drinks it down, whirlpool and all, challenging eyes not leaving Garth’s face.

The game then descends in to chaos, which no one should be surprised by because it always ends this way.  Alliances broken. Vendettas created. Good natured yelling ensues.  Donna’s actually surprised that they lasted five rounds before it happened this time.

About an hour later after all the metaphorical dust has settled, they are quiet again, all staring at the board.  Roy clears his throat and looks back up at the group. “I don’t want to admit it, but did I just win by accident?”

Wally holds up his hand and Roy reaches over to give him a high five. “I’ve never seen anyone actually win by hoarding money before. That bonus usually isn’t worth it. Well played.”

Shaking his head with a small smile, Dick laughs. “I was taken down by my own greed! I might as well have been caught monologue-ing.”

“Let’s be real though.  If you were a villain you would totally be a monologuer. Droning on and on about our impending doom.  I can see it now,” says Wally.  Dick looks put out for a moment, but then laughs again, because he knows it true.

Garth reaches across the table and shakes Dick’s hand. They had ended up tied for last place. “I would say that you fought with honour, but you obviously did not with all those corruption markers. My error was not being bold enough.”

“I think that we were all so busy trying to take each other down that it was more of a war of attrition and Roy just end up on top…” says Lilith as she studies the cards left on the table.

Standing and stretching his arms above his head, Roy grins. “Either way, a win is a win.  Celebratory root beer floats are on me. Assuming we have root beer in the fridge.”

Wally nods, “I stocked up this morning.”

The rest of the team moves into the kitchen while Donna remains to pack up the game, as it is her week to do so. These nights are her favourites. Any squabbles from the field have been forgotten and everyone is relaxed and having fun just simply being together. Dick is mellow, pressure of leading the team vanished. Wally is reveling in them all just being together. Lilith can let go and just be herself. Roy left all his faux-arrogance at the door. Garth doesn’t feel split between two worlds.  She can see them in the kitchen, talking and laughing while Roy starts to make the floats, and smiles when she sees him making one of them with Coke instead of root beer and sticks a straw in it to remember which it is; she’s never liked the taste and he always remembers. It’s all the little things that add up that make nights like these wonderful.

These are her friends. Her team. Her family. And she would do anything for them, always.

Except during the game, of course.


End file.
